AN AWKWARD TIME TO SAY "OOPS"

If Myron T. Steele is nominated to be Delaware's next
chief justice, an ill-timed conversation he had 10
days ago with a lawyer in an emotionally-charged rent
case could come back to haunt him.

State senators are saying they would want Steele to
explain himself if Gov. Ruth Ann Minner submits his name
for confirmation to the center seat on the state's
highest court, where he has sat as a justice since 2000.

"I would want a better explanation than I have seen
to date. I'm not saying I would hang anybody over this,
but I'd like to see a better explanation," said state
Sen. Steven H. Amick, a Newark Republican who is the
only lawyer in the 21-member Senate.

Steele is said to be one of three candidates, along
with Justices Randy J. Holland and Carolyn Berger, on a
confidential list sent to the governor last week by her
Judicial Nominating Commission to consider as a
replacement for Chief Justice E. Norman Veasey, who is
retiring April 7 at the end of his term.

Steele, who is a Kent County Democrat like Minner and
has spent more than 15 years sitting on the state's
major courts, is regarded as the front-runner for a post
that would give him a 12-year term not just as the head
of the five-member Supreme Court, but as the leader of
the entire 54-member judiciary.

An appointment for chief justice is as delicate a
nomination as there is, because of the status of the
court system as a source of state pride and revenue. Its
jewel is the Court of Chancery, the renowned bench for
business law, but recently the Superior Court has chimed
in as principally responsible for Delaware's ranking by
the U.S. Chamber of Commerce as the best legal system in
the country for three years in a row.

With the stakes so high, it is a bad time for even a
whiff of controversy, but that is where Steele finds
himself. It has to do with a case allowing the removal
of rent caps for hundreds of Sussex County mobile-home
tenants who already were agitated enough to form
themselves into an association and clamor for help from
their legislators.

Steele participated in a three-judge panel hearing
the case, which was an appeal of a Superior Court
opinion that had gone against the tenants. As first
reported by the Cape Gazette, in between the Supreme
Court hearing on March 16 and the court decision issued
formally on March 17, the tenants found out from a
manager for the mobile-home park corporation they had
lost.

The tenants were outraged by the leak and blamed it
on a conversation between Steele and John W. Paradee,
the Dover lawyer who represented the corporation. The
two are friends.

Judges are not supposed to talk to lawyers on one
side without the lawyers from the other side, to prevent
anyone from having an advantage. The situation was
serious enough for Veasey to get involved and write a
letter of explanation to Paradee and Olha N.M. Rybakoff,
the deputy attorney general who represented the tenants.

Veasey called the lapse a clerical error. According
to the letter, Steele and the other justices decided the
case shortly after the oral arguments, and Steele told
his secretary to fax their ruling immediately to the two
lawyers, even though it was not officially to be
docketed until the next day. The faxes were not sent,
but Steele did not know it when he spoke with Paradee.

"This is an unfortunate, but innocent, administrative
error that the court regrets. But because it was
innocent and in good faith, there is no basis for
disciplinary action against either Justice Steele or Mr.
Paradee," Veasey wrote.

Something that may not carry disciplinary action
still can have political ramifications, particularly
because it remains unclear why Steele and Paradee would
talk when they did and because there are angry and
suspicious tenants out there.

It has the attention of senators who would be casting
the votes if Minner nominates Steele for chief justice.

"It doesn't promote his chances, I'll put it that
way," said Senate President Pro Tem Thurman G. Adams
Jr., a Bridgeville Democrat. "It is very possible it
will be brought up."

"Trouble, no. Questions, yes," said Senate Minority
Leader John C. Still III, a Dover Republican. "I
consider Myron a friend, and I need to get some
clarification."

In a telephone interview on Friday, Steele said if
the time comes for him to answer questions, he will
answer them.

It is too early to tell how much, if any, fallout
there will be in the choice of the next chief justice.
Minner has yet even to interview the candidates,
according to Gregory B. Patterson, the governor's
communications director, and the Senate has to wait for
her.

In what could become a complication for Steele, it
does not appear that he has the sort of strong Senate
patron who could silence serious objections, if they
occur.

Adams has made no secret of his regard for Holland, a
fellow Sussex Countian, even if Holland is a Republican.
Adams noted it was Holland whom he asked to administer
the oath making him the president pro tem -- "that tells
you what I think of him."

Sen. Nancy W. Cook, the Senate's leading Kent County
Democrat, had nothing to say about Steele. Nor would
Still take up for Kent County pride from the Republican
side, saying only, "What's nice is to get the best
person. If it's Kent County, that's a plus."

Meanwhile, there is something of a campaign arising
from elements of the bench and bar for Holland, who has
sat on the Supreme Court since 1986.

For example, a press release arrived Friday from the
Administrative Office of the Courts, recognizing Holland
for a "high and rare honor from a prestigious and
centuries-old lawyer organization in England," an award
given only to two other U.S. judges, Supreme Court
Justices Ruth Bader Ginsberg and John Paul Stevens.
Veasey is quoted.

Amid the uncertainty, Amick, the lawyer in the Senate
chamber, is awaiting developments on Steele. "I would
not disqualify him because of an incident that happened
one time, but it raises issues," he said. "In two or
three conversations I've had with lawyers about this,
eyebrows have flipped up."